Goverment scrap Consumer Focus and hand all the work to Citizens Advice

In what can only be seen as an act of stupidity, the government are abolishing the taxpayer-funded watchdog Consumer Focus, and dumping its responsibilities on Citizens Advice, which, lest we forget, is a charity, and one which has had funding slashed under the aforementioned governement.

Citizens Advice will be handed the responsibility of dealing with consumer gripes in those areas which aren’t regulated, while a new National Trading Standards Board will target rogue traders. Apparently, it’ll all ‘help streamline the consumer landscape” and “ensure a powerful consumer voice” to business, government and regulators. So that’s okay then. In short, consumers will be even more screwed than they are now.

Our good friends across the road at Which! have come out against the proposals, with Lord Sir Peter Vicary-Smith being particularly vociferous, saying that, “Giving Office of Fair Trading responsibilities to local Trading Standards officers and the Citizens Advice is like asking GPs to carry out heart surgery. The government knows that failing to enforce consumer law already costs the British public over £6bn a year, but they seem determined to abandon consumers to increasingly sophisticated rip-offs despite the harm this does to the economy.”

But did Consumer Focus even DO anything? Do you lot reckon it’ll make things any better or do the government genuinely not give a toss about consumers?

Have reported Mike Hock’s comment to the moderators, they and I have an agreement not to post anti Apple stories. I have shares in apple, and don’t want your crap causing them to crash. I’m trying to keep this under wraps FFS.

was it keenan or kel who became aroused at the suggestion of orange soda. Anyway – I never could understand the infatuation with the stuff. Sure, it’s ok, even marginally better than cola – but no rival to Lemonade.

The New Labour coalition of various interest parties managed to do the same thing with the BOW/ FSA / Treasury tripartate agreement designed to make no-one responsible for the theft, and allowing everyone to shrug their shoulders afterwards and then say ‘how could this possibly happen’.